Making The Music Industry Sing A Different Tune

January 19, 1997|By Laura Post. Special to the Tribune.

BODEGA, Calif. — What if you could readily name five Native American musicians? What if major symphony orchestras were 50 percent women, and female sound engineers routine? What if music were esteemed as a source of empowerment? If these ideas were reality, then the Institute for the Musical Arts would not be so necessary.

The institute is a multicultural, non-profit, teaching and performing-arts organization near San Francisco. Its goal is to support women, especially women of color, pursuing careers in music and the music business. Through classes and apprenticeships, the institute's students gain expertise in such areas as performance, artist management, lighting/sound, entertainment law, instrument/voice development, marketing, composition, stage management, promotion, recording/engineering and video recording.

"What women need is less theory and more access to resources," said Ann Hackler, executive director of the institute.

Grammy-winning singer-songwriter Bonnie Raitt agrees. "The (institute) is a great idea whose time has come. I wholeheartedly support this breakthrough in helping women to work within all aspects of the music industry."

Seeds for the institute were planted in 1969, when founder June Millington started as lead guitarist for the all-female band Fanny. During the five years that Fanny was active, women in mainstream rock were a rarity--notably the groups Bertha, Goldie and the Gingerbreads, and Deadly Nightshade and two women musicians in male bands, guitarists April Lawton (Ramatam) and Tret Fure (Spencer Davis).

Though mainstream music was largely inaccessible to women, Millington did her part to change that. Through four successful albums with Warner Brothers, Millington and Fanny served notice to the rock world that women could do more than sing--they could also write and play with passion. Still there were nearly no women technicians, booking agents, managers or promoters.

In 1975, Millington was asked to play on Cris Williamson's debut album, "The Changer and the Changed."

It had been a leap from fooling on the ukulele as a child in Millington's native Manila to rock fluency in California, but it was a greater leap between mainstream fame and "women's music." Resonating with the politics of women making music, Millington began to connect with a larger theme.

"The experience of staying in women's homes all over the country showed me that the feminist movement was real, alive, in motion and that I was very much a part of it," Millington said, referring to a concert tour with Williamson. "It shook me and filled me with pride."

Millington began to conceive of mentorship for women pursuing music. "I thought, Let's try to share resources and develop role models. I also believed, and still do, that women of different cultures don't cross-pollinate enough."

The origins of the Institute for the Musical Arts reflect such cross-pollination. In 1986, Millington clarified her proposals: She wanted to bridge the gap between women in commercial music and in Women's Music and to promote social justice within the music industry.

On the strength of Millington's multicultural educational and networking goals, the San Francisco Women's Foundation gave the institute its first sizable grant, $5,500. During the next year, the institute sponsored a mini-symposium, an intensive performance workshop in conjunction with the annual conference of the Association of Women's Music and Culture, 12 California workshops and seven other classes nationwide linked with Millington's gigs. The workshops incorporated accomplished female performers and other music-industry professionals.

By 1988, the institute had an active advisory board, with a membership that reads like a celebrity list: musician Annette Aguilar; producer Leslie Ann Jones (more than 60 titles to her credit, currently with Capitol Records); and Roma Baran (Laurie Anderson's producer). The late Audre Lorde, poet and radical thinker, also served until her death in December 1992.

In 1991, the dream began to solidify when the institute's Cultural Center/Studio Retreat was established at a former coastal artists' colony. A rustic, funky, bucolic setting, the new space features gallery and classroom areas, sleeping quarters and a 100-seat performance chamber. The grand piano, snaking wires and exquisite sound system contrast with the cut-stone floors, farm ambience and sheep grazing out back.

Typically, 60 people -- predominantly women, all ages -- turn up for an event; many of the participants are repeaters. Impromptu riffing is not unusual in the middle of the night; all guests are warmly welcomed; and most activities are videotaped for storage in the institute's multimedia archives.